I’ve coined a new hashtag I call the #HIMSSHaze. Any reporters, people working at HIMSS, vendors exhibiting at HIMSS, and related professionals know what the #HIMSSHaze is. As a blogger, the biggest challenge is the 400+ pitches (not accounting for duplicates or pitches that contain 10 companies in one email) that land in my email inbox. It’s a bit overwhelming and they don’t stop even right up until the event. Plus, during the event they then send out all their press releases announcing something at the event.
You can imagine that a lot of stuff gets lost in the noise. However, I like to make a sincere effort to go through each pitch I receive, evaluate it, and at least tell them if I have time or not. At least until my schedule is full. If you waited until now to send it to me, I don’t have much sympathy when I don’t have time to meet because my schedule is full. Luckily, most PR people understand that when they pitch you so late. Although, it’s a bit sad when a great pitch comes in late and your schedule is full, but I digress.
My HIMSS blogger experience aside, what going through 400+ pitches provides me is a great view at what’s going to happen at HIMSS. After reading all of the pitches, press releases, and comments, I have a pretty good feel for the topics that are going to be popular at HIMSS.
One thing that’s clear to me is that mobile health is really starting to finally have a strong presence at HIMSS 2015. Sure, we’ve always had a mobile health startup or two spread around HIMSS. Also, every EHR vendor’s been considering their mobile strategy. However, in 2015 I’m seeing mobile health companies starting to really establish themselves in the industry.
I’ll be talking with a bunch of them at HIMSS and trying to assess the impact they’re really having on healthcare. It’s no surprise that communication apps are some of the strongest in the mobile health space. At the end of the day, quality communication can really improve healthcare. The mobile devices provide a whole suite of new communication opportunities.
I’d love to hear where you see mobile health taking off at HIMSS.
Hi John,
I’m curious to hear if you have seen much in the wellness/behavioral health space. That’s the primary interest of the company I work for, which has a self-led CBT application focusing on helping people manage stress, anxiety, and depression. Other companies have tried other approaches, using crowdsourcing or telehealth to tackle similar problems.
In general mobile health apps tend to focus on fitness, tracking, and chronic disease states, but I think that enhancing that ecosystem to be more holistic – and hopefully, integrated! – could go a long way towards greater patient engagement and better health outcomes.
Thanks for all of your good work!
Brian
Brian,
There are some, but you’re right that a large portion of them are focused on fitness, tracking and chronic disease states. I agree that most of the behavioral health solutions are focused on telehealth type solutions.
I think we see the same thing in behavioral health IT as we do in regular healthcare. We don’t quite know how to handle it and so it doesn’t get enough attention.
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